College Roundup: Navy beats Army to advance in volleyball

NAVY VOLLEYBALL:Patriot League Setter of the Year Patricia Mattingly had 26 assists and 10 digs to help lead the No. 2 Mids past No. 3 Army West Point, 3-0, to advance to Sunday’s Patriot League Women’s Volleyball Championship Game.

Mattingly finished with a double-double, while Navy hit .256 as a team to sweep the Black Knights. Army West Point hit just .046 in the loss.

Navy’s balanced offense featured six players with five or more kills, led by Maddi Sgattoni, Maggie Phillips and Sarena Seelbach, who all finished with seven apiece.

The Mids will face top-seeded American in the Patriot League Championship game, set for Sunday at 3 p.m. at Bender Arena in Washington, D.C.

Navy is playing in its first tournament final since 1999 and has never won the tournament, while American, which defeated No. 4 Lehigh in three sets in the day’s first semifinal, has appeared in the championship match each year since it joined the Patriot League in 2001 and has claimed all but two titles (2009, ’12) in that span.

NAVY MEN’S BASKETBALL: Senior Bryce Dulin poured in 21 points and senior Tom Lacey posted a double-double in Navy’s 79-71 win at Bryant on Saturday afternoon. Navy improved to 2-2 with its first road win of the season, while Bryant fell to 0-3.

“It was a great win for us,” said Navy head coach Ed DeChellis. “We didn’t play very well on Wednesday night at Penn, and the team showed some real resiliency coming back here on Saturday afternoon and playing another one on the road.”

Navy led by 12 points with 5:21 left in the second half, but the Bulldogs reeled off a 12-2 run to cut the margin to just two points at 72-70 with 90 seconds remaining. Bryant’s run was keyed by back-to-back 3-pointer by sophomore Adam Grant.

Senior guard Shawn Anderson made a steal in the lane to thwart a Bryant possession and then junior guard Hasan Abdullah made a free throw to put Navy ahead 74-70 with 40 seconds remaining.

After the teams each traded one free throw, Lacey made a critical block on Bosko Kostur’s 3-point attempt with 15 seconds left before two free throws by Abdullah pushed Navy’s lead to six. Grant missed another 3-pointer with under 10 seconds left and Dulin grabbed the rebound then made two more free throws to seal the win at 79-71.

“That was a good thing for us,” DeChellis said about his team holding off the late Bryant rally. “But we did some foolish things on the press offense to let Bryant come back. We have to get better at taking care of the basketball in those situations. When you have time and the lead, you have to get a good shot every time down the floor. You can’t turn the ball over.”

Navy shot a season-high 54.2 percent from the floor (26-of-48) and also shot a season-best from 3-point range at 52.9 percent (9-of-17). Navy’s nine 3-pointers made were a season-high.

“We made some baskets today, which opened some things up for us on the inside,” said DeChellis. “Bryce and Shawn played a lot of two-man basketball together with one of them posting up. That helped to get them some shots and to also get to the free throw line.”

Navy outrebounded Bryant, 37-23, to post its largest rebound margin of the season at +14.

Dulin was 6-of-15 from the floor, 4-of-9 on 3-pointers and 5-of-10 at the free throw line for his season-high 21 points. Dulin also had four rebounds, two assists and one steal in a career-high 39 minutes.

Lacey posted his eighth career double-double in the contest with 17 points and a game-high 11 rebounds. Lacey was 7-of-10 from the floor and 3-of-3 from the free throw line, while also tallying two assists and two blocked shots in 36 minutes. Lacey scored 13 of his 17 points after halftime.

Lacey also had a big game in Navy’s win against Bryant last season with 16 points and 17 rebounds.

Abdullah scored 16 points in the contest and knocked down three 3-pointers. He also had four rebounds and two steals.

Anderson scored 11 of his 14 points in the second half, while also filling up the stat sheet with seven rebounds, five assists and one steal.

Navy was playing its fourth game in a fourth different state in the season’s first nine days on Saturday. Navy will next host Division III Washington College on Wednesday at 3 p.m.

NAVY MEN’S CROSS COUNTRY: Racing on the grandest stage of national competition for the second straight year, the NCAA Championship, the Mids recorded a 31st-place finish on Saturday. Taking on the 10k course at Louisville’s E.P. “Tom” Sawyer Park, Navy kept a relatively close pack of five throughout the race as all five scoring runners finished within 70 places of each other. Jake Brophy led the team’s individual effort with a time of 31:17.70, good for 167th place. Kevin Murray finished runner-up to his classmate in 183rd place at 31:25.98 and Cory Donley stayed within shouting distance of his teammates in 195th with a time of 31:34.00.

The senior duo of Gabriel Collison and Josh Hanna rounded out Navy’s counting lineup with respective times of 32:13.11 (231st) and 32:22.52 (235th).

FROSTBURG FOOTBALL: Conner Cox (South River) connected with Sergio Andino (Northeast) for a 17-yard touchdown as the the Bobcats posted yet another impressive defensive effort and the offense ran for a season-high 385 yards in their dominating 35-7 win over ninth-ranked Wittenberg. Cox finished with 116 yards passing and 36 yards on the ground while Andino caught four of Cox’s 11 completions for 44 yards. Frostburg moves on to play Washington & Jefferson, a 31-28 winner over Johns Hopkins.

JOHNS HOPKINS FOOTBALL: Keonte Henson (Broadneck) had four tackles (three solo) but Washington & Jefferson got a 46-yard field goal in the final minute to lift the 10th-ranked Presidents past 19th-ranked Blue Jays, 31-28, in the first round of the NCAA Playoffs.

BOWIE STATE FOOTBALL: Rob Chesson (Old Mill) scored on a 1-yard run and gained just 18 yards on 16 carries while catching two balls for 12 yards as the 14th-ranked Bulldogs were stunned by Delta State in the NCAA Super Region 2 first round game.

SHEPHERD FOOTBALL: DeJuan Neal (Southern) was third on the team with seven tackles, however Findlay (10-2) scored 20 unanswered points in the second half to rally for a 29-17 win over the Rams (10-1) in first round action of the NCAA Division II Football Championship.

LYCOMING MEN’S BASKETBALL: T. J. Duckett (Severna Park, Calvert Hall) continued his hot start to the season, pouring in 15 of 59 bench points, as he hit all five of his 3-pointers, four of which came in the second half, as the 22nd-ranked Warriors pulled away late for a 108-86 win over SUNY Oneonta for their third straight Dutch Burch Tip-Off Tournament Championship.

ST. MARY’S WOMEN’S BASKETBALL: Kobe Chaney (South River) pulled down a game-best 12 rebounds and added a season-best nine points and two blocks but the Seahawks lost their second straight, falling 77-64 to Hood College Friday night at the Dan Greene Memorial Tournament.

On Saturday, Hallie Persell (Chesapeake) hit a jump shot with just seven seconds to play to give host St. Mary's a 60-58 win over visiting Washington College in a non-conference game on day two of the Greene Memorial Invitational. Chaney added a double-double with 10 points and 11 rebounds for the Seahawks.

SALISBURY WOMEN’S BASKETBALL: Aprile Preller (Northeast) tallied four points, four rebounds and an assist But the Sea Gulls lost to Wheaton (Mass.) College 63-51 in the consolation game of the Kean Classic on Saturday afternoon.

MARYLAND FIELD HOCKEY: The ninth-ranked Terps (16-6) will take on No. 1 Connecticut (22-0) in the NCAA Championship game Sunday at 2 p.m. at Louisville's Trager Stadium.

This is Maryland’s 23rd straight NCAA Tournament appearance - the longest active streak in the country. The Terps have made 29 NCAA Tournament appearances and are 60-21 (.741) all-time in NCAA Tournament games, which is the highest Tournament winning percentage in the nation. Head coach Missy Meharg, a Severna Park resident, is 56-20 (.737) all-time in NCAA Tournament games. This is Maryland’s 18th Final Four, 17th under Meharg and first since 2013. As a program, Maryland has won eight NCAA titles (1987, 1993, 1999, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2010, 2011) and seven under Meharg.

MARYLAND WOMEN’S BASKETBALL: The 13th-ranked Maryland women’s basketball team (2-1) will take on No. 1 Connecticut (2-0) today at 1:30 p.m. at the XL Center in Hartford. The game will be televised on ESPN. This is the seventh meeting between Maryland and Connecticut, all since 2012. Most recently, No. 1 Connecticut won 87-81 in College Park on Dec. 29 last year. Kaila Charles scored 18 points. Maryland cut it to a five-point game with 3:42 to play, but the Terps fell just short. Connecticut won 63-48 in the teams’ only meeting at the XL Center on Dec. 3, 2012.